you not having the time or the commitment. people who are trying to profit off of you giving up. it's going to be hard to vote this year in a lot of places where it's most important thaw vote. your country needs you to stick it out no matter who you are voting for, your country needs you to do it. that does it for us tonight. see you tomorrow. now it's time for "the last word." have a great night. polls open in 32 hours. and a brand new msnbc news poll shows a national tie. surprise. it's down to the swing states. >> we are just 48 hours away from election day. >> you have a choice to make. >> this is a campaign about america. >> new polls in key battleground states. >> a batch of new polls released yesterday. >> 48% for the president, 47 for mitt romney. >> we think mitt romney is playing defense. >> talk is cheap. look to the record. >> i welcome home. >> i said i would pass health care, i passed it.

i said i would repeal don't ask, don't tell. >> we're a nation that believes all men and women are created equal. >> rerepealed it. >> talk is shecheap. look to the record. >> i learned that respect goes a long way. >> one in six americans is poor today. >> i'm not concerned about the very poor. we have a safety net there. >> we measure change in achievements. >> he got this jobs report. >> it's definitely a strong jobs report. it's stronger than expected. >> this is 1976 meets 2000 meets 2004. >> you know that i mean what i say and say what i mean. >> if there's anything that people should know about mitt romney at this point -- >> talk is cheap. >> -- nothing i've said in the past should be any indication of my positions in the fewer. >> if you don't run, chris christie, mitt romney will be

the nominee. >> i'm alex wagner in for lawrence o'donnell. tonight, we can reveal the results of the final nchl bc news wall street journal poll. the last one just two days before the election. quoting nbc news republican pollster bill mack kin ter if, the comparisons between 2004 and 2012 are launting. president obama is at 48% and mitt romney gets 47%. that is identical to the final nbc wall street journal poll before the 2004 election. bush, 48%, democrat john kerry, 47%. the race is also close in the swing states where 89 electoral college votes are up for grabs. in ohio, a columbus dispatch poll has president obama at 50% and mitt romney at 48%. in pennsylvania, a ppp poll has

president obama at 52% and mitt romney at 46%. ppp has president obama at 51% and mitt romney at 48% in wisconsin. in iowa, a des moines register poll has president obama at 47% and mitt romney at 42%. as of this afternoon, nate silver of the "new york times" 538 blog forecasts that on november 6 president obama has an 85% chance of winning re-election and that president obama will win 307 electoral college votes and mitt romney will win 231. mitt romney today campaigned in ohio, pennsylvania, virginia, and iowa. his campaign has a sharp new attack line. >> you've probably heard what the president said a couple of days ago. he said you can vote for

revenge. for revenge. i'm telling you, you should vote for love of country. >> and ich got to tell you, when the president just the other day said that people should vote out of revenge, this is not who we are. mitt romney and i are asking you to vote out of love of country. >> joe biden also had sharp criticism of his opponents in ohio. >> these guys are trying to play a con game here at the end. they are trying to say two thing that really created this new republican party. they no longer subscribe to. they no longer subscribe to. when, in fact, it's exactly who they are. the fact is, these guys are shameless. >> president clinton today campaigned with president obama in new hampshire and said this. >> he's trying to figure out how to get out of that in ohio where

one in eight jobs is tied to the auto industry. i said last night when we were in virginia, he's tied himself in so many knots that i expect today he'll be offered a job as a chief contortion nift at circumstance day sew lay. >> joining me now msnbc's krystal ball and ari. it's always a good day on the campaign trail when bill clinton is talking about the circumstance day sole lay. >> i couldn't agree more. >> is chris christie coming out of the woodwork to announce that he is, in fact, supporting mitt romney lesn anyone else think otherwise. >> i endorsed mitt romney 13 months ago because i thought he was the best guy for the job and on tuesday i'm voting for mitt romney because i think he's the best guy for the job but that doesn't mean that i can't turn

to the president and saying thank you sir for providing good leadership and extend my hand of friendship to him. >> krystal, there has been so much blowback on chris christie's photo-ops. what do you make of that statement? >> well, it's interesting bus rupert murdoch said something, like they needed to renew their vows, chris christie and mitt romney. >> right. >> and i think as swing state voters we're watching chris christie's praise of the president, they probably were feeling like he was sort of backing the president. so i understand why he felt pressure to come out. he also has to worry about his own future electoral pros sects. republicans are kind of angling to blame sandy and chris christie for mitt romney's loss. he has to reaffirm the republican base that he's with them. >> ari, when you look at the

president's approval numbers on the storm, i believe it's 67% of the public according to our nbc news numbers, 67% approve, 16% disapprove. 17% not sure. it's not something that the republicans want, certainly sandy has done a good job of not only making the case are for government but showing that the president is capable of working across the aisle? >> yeah. i don't think that people really in ohio, for example, are going to change their mind over the last minute over this leadership, good as it is. but i do think to your point that what we see here is a freezing of the political facts that existed a week ago where mitt romney was gaining a little but no way in the lead. the new poll number out tonight still show this slight but real edge for the president. and not a big edge. but, again, mitt romney lost a week of politicking here and that is the biggest problem. if the republicans now as a

prebuttal or on tuesday after they lose, try to put too much to blame on the natural disaster, they will look even pettier than they do now and that would be difficult. >> speaking of petty, which is a good segway into the jeep ad that the republican campaign has been running, which is undermining what the president did in ohio and in the states where the car companies are powerful employers and have employed large numbers of americans, to undermine the work that the president has done there, bill clinton on the stump offering a great rejoineder to the campaign's very false and misleading ads regarding jeep. let's take a listen to what he had to say. >> when he couldn't get out of the fact that he actually did oppose the automobile plan, he starts saying that president obama is allowing jeep to move american jobs to china. did you see that? even general motors said, this is not true.

jeep is owned by chrysler, is owned by fiat, you know. so then the charge became, the president is working the italians. to move jobs to china. a few days ago and i'm toast. now we're laughing. but it's absurd. is that the kind of decider in chief you want? i don't think so. >> nobody can point out the absurdity like bill clinton, krystal? >> he's absolutely amazing and i'm actually hopeful that this one time the lie actually caught up with mitt romney because people in ohio, they actually know what is going on with the auto industry and the lie was so blatant that the local papers have had to run articles about it, not just in the fact checking section but as headline news and that's to me what is so despicable here.

he's not just talking about some random political fact that doesn't have a real impact on people's lives. >> right. >> he's trying to scare people about their livelihood and that is disgusting and pathetic and desperate. >> and also raise the hackels of the auto industry and gm themselves, these are lies. it could not have backfired more spectacularly. >> right. and that's the difference between the validaters that are speaking. tuesday is coming and the connective tish is, you have bill clinton there who has a democratic voice and trust on the economy and he had sort of a beat poet thing going on with his hands fluttering and that's one way to make the argument. the other way is to have ceos, millionaires say mitt romney is a liar. mitt romney doesn't understand the auto industry. mitt romney is lying to you and

people calling up their bosses at plants and trying to figure out where their jobs were in danger and the answer is no. that goes to the final point, which is, what do we see here? we see the romney campaign acting like losers. >> yep. >> they are lying because they have nothing left to do. that's a loser move. okay? they are going in and trashing governor christie and politico and saying and impuning what he's doing on the storm and saying he's a running mate. that's a loser move. that's a loser move for after the election and doing hail mary pass passes. >> and the revenge comments which we played at the beginning of this program, krystal, seemed to be grabbing at whatever you can get. will anybody believe that the president is somehow encouraging revengeful behavior and not someone who has spoken at length

since the beginning of his candidacy about the importance of that more perfect union? >> if anybody is voting out of anger and hatred in this election, it is not on the democratic side. it does come off as desperate as the ad does. and paul ryan's camp, his people are floating store rears to the press about what he might do if they lost. so that's another sign -- >> you know what that is? that's a loser move. >> that's a loser move, to borrow ari's term. but i think the romney campaign throughout this entire campaign have tried to grab on any sound bite, any news cycle point that they can and try to win the day rather than looking at the longer term and trying to win the campaign. >> dealing from the bottom of the deck at the high stakes table. krystal ball and ari melber, thank you both for joining me tonight. >> thanks, alex. who is where and why? former dnc chairman howard dean joins me. and the clinton effect on the

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the last hours of the ground game. former dnc chair howard dean joins me with a look at the push to get every last likely voter excited enough to vote. and later we head down ballot to the senate races where the balance of power is at stake and so is a balance of crazy. that's coming up. you know, i was once used for small jobs. yeah, and i took on all the bigger, tougher ones. but now that mr. clean's got this new select-a-size magic eraser, i mean, he can take on any size job. look how easily he gets things cleaned. it's enough to make you cry. you, specifically. not me.

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the people who are making up this election. and so two more days. >> i need iowa so we can win the white house and take back america. >> ultimately it's up to you. you have the power. and if you're willing to work with me and stand with me, if you're willing to knock on some doors with me, if you're willing to make some phone calls with me, if you're willing to turn out with me, we'll win new hampshire. we'll win this election. we'll finish what we started. we'll renew those bonds that do not break and reaffirm the spirit that makes the united states of america the greatest nation on earth. let's go get it. >> president obama and his re-election campaign are in full throttle at battleground states. >> a ground game unlike any that

american politics has ever seen and much bigger than what we did in 2008. these tastages localized in the final days. these neighborhood teams that we mentioned have had million of conversations with persuadable voters. >> the obama re-election campaign has 137 field offices in ohio compared with 40 for mitt romney. politico says, enthusiasm is key in the ohio ground game and the romney team is putting a bigger emphasis on door knocking this cycle. the democrats are banking on comprehensive targeting to win in ohio. their early vote effort has been a major piece of that strategy and polling shows it has paid off. the campaign is about two-thirds ahead among voters who have cast early ballots here. joining me now is howard dean.

thank you for taking the time to speak with me today. >> thanks for having me on. i particularly like that you have the power that the president talked about. that was from 2004. >> indeed. indeed. governor dean, let's talk a little bit about the ground game here. there's been a lot of analysis in the month and days leading up to this in terms of number of field offices, as i mentioned, 125 to 40 in terms of offices in ohio. the obama campaign says it has reached 125 million people on the ground and it's being reported that romney's campaign has only reached 50 voter since the spring. that is a disadvantage, is it not? >> it's a very important advantage. i think the republicans are doing better than they did in the ground game but nobody has done this better than the obama campaign, i think in political history. i do expect we're going to win. i do expect we're going to win

iowa and ohio and that should do it. >> let's listen to what speaker of the house john boehner, who of course is from ohio, he gave his prediction on fox news this morning. >> forget everything i said about the obama ground game. the romney ground game is bigger and more enthusiastic than anything i have seen. polls don't decide elections. voters do. >> just to be clear, you're guaranteeing a victory? >> no question in my mind. >> for mitt romney in ohio? >> no question in my mind. >> the speaker seems to be saying two things, the romney campaign is more sophisticated than the obama campaign and then also says we have enthusiasm on our side. i think it's probably one or the other but in terms of the enthusiasm question, what do you make of it? is it really momentum or is fauxmemtum? >> i don't think it's momentum. unfortunately, the secretary of state is on their side who

happens to be a very partisan individual and that could be a problem. because we're very, very anxious about an honest vote count and honest voting process at the ohio secretary of state and florida governor have done everything they can to discourage voting and that's something that we have to be very, very careful of. this has to be a fair election. we've got to be sure that it's a fair election. we're going to be very attentive to that. but i think if it's a fair election we're going to win. there's a lot more enthusiasm for the president than there was two or three months ago. people are really getting excited about this president. the president himself has gotten more exciting, which is nice to see as a passionate person running for office and the third piece is that the republicans have made major missteps. mitt romney -- it's almost impossible to see what mitt romney stands for. he's gone from a severe conservative to a modest moderate and the truth is people think he want to be president

because he wants to be president with no particular program or philosophy. that's not really -- you can't win the presidency that way. >> governor, to that way n. terms of the great wall of obuscation, it's probably worth noting that in the first eight weeks paul ryan did nearly 125 interviews with local television affiliate hes but he's not done any local tv since october 8th when this interview in michigan ended abruptly. let's listen. >> the best thing to help violent crime in the inner cities is to help people get out of poverty, help teach people good discipline, good character. that is society. that is what charities and civic group and churches do to help one another make sure they realize the value in one another. >> and by with a big tax cut? >> those are yours, not mine. >> thank you very much, sir. >> that was kind of strange. trying to stuff words in

people's mouth? >> unmiked and that was the last we've heard from paul ryan. and mitt romney hasn't done one in 23, 24 days, governor. is that unusual for someone running for the highest office in the land? >> no. the reason they are doing that, the truth is, when you do a one-on-one interview, you get tough questions. ryan can't because he's a true right wing conservative and not clearly the president and his people are trying to position romney differently and ryan's not going to do that. ryan's view on abortion is exactly the same as richard mourdock and todd akin. in fact, akin and ryan co-sponsored one of the anti-abortion bills. and i think they muzzled ryan on purpose and romney converted himself through various phases from a moderate to a right wing to a moderate again and he can't stand up to those kind of

questioning because he doesn't appear to be at anyplace. >> when given a multiple choice test, they dloe throw away the pencil. >> the greatest quote about this is ted kennedy versus mitt romney in 1994 when kennedy said i'm the pro-choice candidate and mitt romney is the multiple choice candidate. >> he nailed it. that is a clip that should be on loop for some time to come. former governor from vermont, howard dean, thank you for joining me this evening. >> thanks for having me on, alex. the fight for control over the senate. who is likely to hold on and who has absolutely no chance at all and where does that missouri race stand right now? joy reid and ryan grim join me coming up.

former president bill clinton is making nearly as many stops as president barack obama this weekend. his effect on the 2012 race and why he still matters. with ana marie cox and nia-malika henderson. first, what changes and what stays the same after tuesday night? that's next. [ man ] ring ring... progresso

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day, the democrats appear to be holding their majority, thanks at least in part to two conservative candidates who made rape a campaign issue. democratic congressman joe donnelly has a lead over republican richard mourdock,% to 36%. it's skyrocketed since pregnancies resulting from rape are, quote, something that god intended to happen. democratic incumbent clair mckas still has a 4-point lead over todd akin. in august, akin declared that women could not become pregnant from a rape saying, quote, if it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.

both indiana and missouri are seats that the republicans had hoped to flip and that seems less likely now and a firewall could get a boost in massachusetts in perhaps the hottest senate race of 2012, senator scott brown now trails elizabeth warren. a poll shows warren leading brown by four point, 50% to 46 in massachusetts. joining me now are joy reid, managing editor of the grio and ryan grim, washington bureau chief for "the huffington post." joy, i want to go to you first in terms of the akin and mourdock races, these guys can't help but stepping in it and now it seems like the chickens are coming home to roost. >> thanks to crazy, democrats are going to hold on to the seat. thank you, crazy. i think it's good that these guys ran in the sense that it has ripped the veil off of something that particularly younger women, a lot of democrats either didn't know or

didn't want to think about, which is that you have a hard core religious element within the republican party that does believe that women should not be making basic choices about their health care and that women have ruined the workforce for being in it. >> and women being dragged around by their hair and so forth? >> indeed. i'm predicting that mccaskill will do better than that margin. a lot of people say they are going to vote for republican but i have a pretty good feeling she is going to do well. >> ryan, it's amazing how it's turned the departure of senior leadership, the republican senate committee basically said, we're not going to give you any money was i think -- it happened very, very quickly. and yet it seems like akin has gotten a $2 million infusion into his campaign. part of that is from donation and part of it may or may not be from republican leadership that

is terrified that they are going to lose control of the senate because they have such weak candidates and may be piping money into the akin race. i will read you an excerpt from "the hill." they saw their guy getting his teeth knocked over nothing and he may be a son of a b but he's our son of a b. what do you make of that? >> it's a good way of putting it is it was his to lose because he went out and actually did lose it. and the same thing is true with mourdock. that was his race to lose. that was in the r column. people weren't even -- donnelly had some hard core shot but that was his to lose as well and, bam, he lost it. and national republicans and we talk about this before, you know, national republicans and national democrats are kind of amoral when it comes to who they are going to support. their primary driver is that they want somebody who can win. >> right. >> now, right now they have a bunch of losers but these are the losers that they have to go with. and so with just a couple days

left, the inclination is to get behind them and it looks like national republicans put some money into the akin race. >> secretly let that get out, that they are supporting akin. joy, we saw in 2010 in the midterms the republicans were running extremist candidates, people who did not have a chance on the national stage and yet they seem to have not learned their lesson. these are two primary lessons of you, take these candidates and they are not going to win. they are going to turn over the power to the democrats. >> right. but i think if you listen to the noise on the right, if we can just stop running these wish she wash she ryan knows, we could actually win. and the close loop is so sealed on the right i don't think there's a self-awareness because there was a clamor to get these pure conservative candidates on the ballot and it came from the tea party. so the tea party was a blessing and a curse. it gave them energy in the midterms because it energized older voters, those who didn't like barack obama.

but the down side of the tea party is they are insisting on what they are truly seeing as conservative candidates and married to the religious right. these guys like mourdock did not lose an eye oath ta of support by the right. >> will it be a lesson to them? ryan, i like dorking out on these senate races because i think it's totally fascinating. arizona has been interesting to me, given the fact that this is a seat that the republicans have held through john kyle for basically two decades and there's a chance that the democratic challenger could take that away from the candidates and in some part that's due to the fact that the language around immigration, around the hispanic community in arizona has been so divisive, you have dr. richard carmona at one time served president bush and i think he's a safe haven for latinos who feel like they've been shut out of the republican party in that state. >> right. and carmona has a decent chance

and for those very reasons, despite how far right arizona is, i think its days as a deep red state are numbered because the latino population is growing and the tea party opposition to those folks is so strident that it's not going to moderate itself just because it's damaging them electorally and that's the big problem that the -- the kind of gop establishment has with the tea party. they often don't care if they lose. >> right. >> they would rather, you know, die trying. you know, they'd rather put an akin or chris -- >> or christine or don nel in there. >> right. somebody like that and stand on principle and go down whereas the gop establishment is, no, let's put up moderates that can win in these states. although even when the gop establishment did win in wisconsin, tommy thompson is

getting ham bettered by tammy baldwin. >> especially since scott walker has such an infrastructure. the question is, joy, you know, when it's all said and done, if they end up losing these seats and the republican party has a long session on the psych trust couch, will they say it's time to purge these radical ideas? >> no, i think they are embedded and they are calling the shots. look, all of the money that we've seen come into politics after citizens united, most of it has gone to enforce strict party discipline on the establishment republicans. the people most afraid of the tea party are people like john boehner who will get primaried if they walk away from them. i think it's so deeply embedded within the party and the base is so dependent on getting those people excited, they are not going anywhere. >> joy reid, ryan grim, thank you both for joining me tonight. if you want more on the upper chamber battle royale, i'll be dorking out and following the races on election night on the

primetime election coverage starting at 6:00 p.m. with rachel, chris, lawrence, al, and ed, as if we'd ever let you forget it. coming up, the bill clinton effect on the 2012 race, especially in the final sprint. a nchl a marie cox and nia-malika henderson join me. and the little what the lilly ledbetter act can tell you about mitt romney. that's coming up next. d out exay where it is using bing elections. it's a good day for politics. which way do you lean politically? conservative. republican. well, using the bing news selector you can find news from whichever way you lean. (together) social on this side, financial. which party is currently predicted to win a majority in the senate? the republicans? would you make a bet on that? no. are you chicken? customer erin swenson bought so, i'm happy. today. sales go up... i'm happy.

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and ink helps us do it. make your mark with ink from chase. as you can see, i have given my voice in the service of my president. >> what was once a relationship of political necessity has blossomed into a full on presidential bromance. the relationship between president obama and former president bill clinton has been on full display in the campaign trail. team obama is strategically deploying president clinton like a scud missile. after four events on thursday, president clinton stumped at four campaign stops in florida

on friday, first in lake worth, then speaking to supporters in ft. myers, next it was st. petersburg outside of tampa before ending friday night in the state capital of tallahassee. then, yesterday president clinton shifted his focus to the swing state of virginia beginning in chess sta beak and ending an hours drive outside of washington, d.c. president obama was introduced to a crowd of supporters and stopping for a hug before the president made his case to virginia voter. today the presidents obama and clinton started a double-team strategy and after ward former president clinton was moving on to north carolina and because he can't be in two places at once, he let his words speak for him in iowa, pinning this op-ed, governor romney plans to reduce

taxes again on the wealthiest americans and make large cuts in programs that help the middle class and poor children and spark new economic opportunity. the president is creating a more inclusive, fair america. his policies will bring back middle class jobs and incomes and help the poor. and his policies will keep us on the road toward a more perfect union. joining me now, ana marie cox and nia-malika henderson. the tones of fleet wood mac, when socks was a cat in a white house. >> i thought we were done with that for a while. i really did. >> it's striking how much this relationship has warmed up in the last four years. >> it is. it's so much. at first you could tell clinton was being a good soldier. he was going out and doing what he needed to do. wasn't really maybe having the best time. over the past year i think we've seen, you know, be clinton starting to have the good time he always has on the stump and that turning into, yeah, a

bromance from the two of them. they are this far from a terrace fist bump, i swear. they kind of did a high five. they are getting there. >> we are looking forward to that. america is. nia, let's talk about george w. bush on the clinton-obama relationship. certainly it's a good thing that they are getting along and certainly clinton's appeal to a class of voters that the president hasn't been able to crack, which is white working class voters, right? >> that's right. we saw bill clinton is making these appearances in person in these swing states but i've got to tell you, i was down in south carolina and that clinton ad where he talks about obama is running nonstop is running in south carolina, not exact legal a swing state. but i think if you look a bill clinton, is he a singular figure in american politics there. is no comparable figure in the republican party and he can appeal across the board to

latinos, to african-americans, to working class white people, to college-educated white people and that, i think, why you see him out there front and center and also behind the scenes he's played an important role in terms of advising the obama campaign in terms of strategy. on november 9th of last year there was a meeting between david al sectixelrod where they mitt romney as a conservative rather than focusing on his flip-flopping across the issues and that is what you've seen play out over these last many month and certainly has engaged the base in this election. >> ana, the usage of fleetwood mac, obviously s. a nostalgia piece but the president in every win of his stump speeches mentions the golden era of america, where we had budget surpluses and everything was try angulated and everybody was

happy. it's a departure from where he has been previously. >> that's true and it's in the way that republicans don't and i think, yes, like that clinton people remember very fondly. people do not remember the george bush period very fondly. there's obviously a connection. there. i have to say, i'm not always sure clinton gives the best campaign advice, painting mitt as a conservative was muddied in the past few weeks but his instincts are obviously just amazing. the speech he gave last night, there is no other politician with the am pli tud that clinton has, the ability to go from the rhetorical highs to the jabs, sort of in one sentence. >> and even in an op-ed, you go from a more perfect union, to the sort of tone and -- >> he can go from bluegrass to opera in a single paragraph. >> nia, republicans are scared of bill clinton. michele bachmann in her

campaign -- yes, she still has a campaign. fellow conservative, no time to explain. i just got word bill clinton is coming to my district today to personally campaign against me. i need your support right away. please go to my website right here and make an immediate donation, as if he's a hurricane himself, right? >> one of the interesting things that i think you've seen from republicans is they have in some ways embraced bill clinton as well. one of the oddest moments i had on the campaign trail was hearing newt gingrich praise bill clinton. i was like, did you actually live through that presidency? there was such lava heads. i think it's in some ways backfired with them embracing bill clinton as a moderate and trying to fame president obama as carter because that was very much poking the bear and you saw that the bear very much bit back. >> the bear has woken. the bear has woken.

nia-malika henderson and ana marie cox, thank you both for joining me tonight. >> thank you. coming up, more evidence that moderate mitt is a complete mit. here's what heays about men's rights behind closed doors and it is not about the binders. system and the world's only tridion safety cell rights behind closed doors and it is not about the binders. wh rights behind closed doors and it is not about the binders. wh rights behind closed doors and it is not about the binders. wh rights behind closed doors and it is not about the binders. ar rights behind closed doors and it is not about the binders. honey, they have the 55 inch lg...

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i went to a number of women's groups and they brought me whole binders of women. >> that was mitt romney during the skd debate. here is a 2007 video of mitt romney taking about his real record of women when he thought

he wasn't being recorded. >> i was governor four years. i had a number of pieces of legislation that dealt with abortion, abstinence education, ru-486. and so forth. i vetoed any bill that was in favor of choice. >> joining me now, my friend and colleague, msnbc's melissa harris pf perry. right now, you've got it. >> wow. >> there's been a lot of discussion exactly where mitt romney stands on issues that are critical to women and women's reproductive rights and i've used the term and it's been and there you have it, it says it all. >> first of all, isn't he so much more fascinating and interesting whenever he doesn't realize that he's on camera? >> yes. >> very much like the 47% comments. you get the sense of passion and i think as you point out, it's

really hard to figure out who is mitt romney, the salt lake city paper gave their endorsement to president obama. right? they were like, because we don't know which mitt it s this is mitt romney talking about his moderate self, right? the self that got along with the democrats in massachusetts and there you get all of that fire behind making sure that women don't have the ability to chose. >> i guess my question is, there's been talk about the gender gap and romney closing the gender gap. "the huffington post" has an analysis out that says that bump among women was a residual effect of the first debate and when you look at the polling numbers among unmarried women, the president is womping, which i think is an official term -- prognosticate on that, nate silver. he's leading 25% among married women. i don't understand how any women can be in favor of a candidate who really has extreme views on anything relating to women and

women's bodies. >> when you look at the intersection of -- the question should always be which women. women have never operated as a block but it's particularly appalling in this election cycle with what you see what is driving the gender gap is the intersection of race, youth, and unmarried status. so young women, unmarried women, and women of color are really -- so if you are married, middle class white woman, your likelihood of supporting mitt romney is quite high and the idea that that group of people would not see their own interests -- >> or their daughter's interest or sisters, because you may not opt into abortion. about being an adult citizen who would be able to make your own decision but, no, i don't think you're an adult. >> and there's also stuff like the lilly ledbetter act where a candidate cannot answer the question. that's a basic economic fairness issue and women voting against their best interests. >> i'm convinced that there's a

group of women for whom the so called patriarch is still quite seductive, that you need a strong man who will give you cover. don't worry, honey, i know you don't want to work, rather than a sense of full citizen equality. which is, in part, about the ability not only to make health choices for yourself but chick choices. >> and that's exactly -- that's mirrored so precisely in romney's speech whenever he talks about working women. i love this clip because i think it says it all. let's listen to what he had to say about work flexibility during the second debate. >> i recognize that if you're going to have women in the workforce, you need to be more flexible. my chief of staff, for instance, had two kids in school. she said, i can't be here until 7:00, 8:00 at night. i need to be able to get home at 5:00 so i can be there for making dinner for my kids and

being with them when i when they get home from school, said, fine, let's have a flexible schedule. >> i recognize that if you're going to have women in the workforce, make a concession to these rable rousers. >> all humans need flex bill tea. this is what a 2012 workforce should look like. so fathers would also like to go home to see their kids. it's not that moms aren't interested in going home early but going home early is the main thing you think of when you think of women workers? >> being able to cook. >> so you can get home to cook. i can't comprehend what that life is, that he is amarriaging that this woman is leading. i've known a lot of women in my time, alex and that seems so aliens me. >> there are so many confusing questions when it comes to